Wednesday 9 January 2008

manager

I rang the General Manager of the Care Home today to talk over a few concerns.

Firstly I asked about the in-house Hair Salon. Mum had told me a few times that she had tried to get her hair done but that there were no available appointments. She's gone a whole month now without having her hair 'set' and I know she'll be miserable about that. The Manager agreed that the Salon was meant to operate 6 days a week, but that she was having trouble sourcing staff to operate more than 1 or 2 days. As elsewhere in this newly-opened complex, the facilities are excellent but the planning and manpower are lagging behind somewhat.

Next, I told her that Mum appeared to be bored and reckons that she does nothing all day. The Manager replied that she had found Mum engaged in a game of Scrabble only yesterday, playing the other residents and a member of staff. I had wondered if it was really just Mum's memory problems that meant that she couldn't tell me what she had been doing. All the same, I asked that the Events Manager make a point of calling on Mum and encouraging her to get involved in some activities.

Finally I got around to the money that I think has gone missing. The Manager sighed and said that this was the first incident that she'd heard of here, but that the same thing had happened at other homes in the group. She took the issue very seriously and said that she would perform a thorough search of Mum's room before taking things further. We discussed using a cash control system whereby I would leave an amount with the Reception staff, who would dole it out to Mum on request, keeping an account updated. I'm going to give that system a try this weekend, when I'll be visiting Mum again.

No comments: